Free People Horoscopes By Tracy Allen, Week Of May 5–May 11

Follow @astrotherapist on Twitter and email tallennyc@gmail.com to schedule a reading over phone or Skype. Available in-person in NYC! $125 for 60 minutes, $150 for 90 minutes.

TAURUS
April 20–May 20
Thanks to an opportune encounter between the sun in Taurus and Jupiter in your cognition-and-communication sector this week, you have a chance to express yourself with ease. Breaking free from unconscious thought patterns and expanding your concept of what’s possible are essential to finding your truth—and then living it. You can’t fully blossom until you get past self-imposed limitations. When the sun opposes Saturn in your relationship angle, you’re compelled to face reality. You may feel like people are impeding you, but more importantly, the strength of your developing identity is being tested through other people. You’re focused on personal growth, and now the need for balancing that with your relationships arises. Resist the natural tendency to project the negative aspect of this onto someone else. Venus’s face-off with Mars pits your desire for downtime against duties and responsibilities. Take care of business, then rest. You can relax completely once you know your work is done.

GEMINI
May 21–June 20
Even though it’s not quite your birthday season yet, your ruling planet Mercury’s entry into Gemini will enliven you. Friendly Venus is already in your group zone, making you feel somewhat social. But the sun is in your seclusion sector, so your actual energy is pretty low-key. Mercury means plenty of communication and interaction, plus an active mind, and those things add up to you feeling like yourself. You’ll be able to get your thoughts out, although given Merc’s run-in with murky Neptune, you can’t expect everyone—particularly authority figures like a parent or a boss—to understand where you’re coming from. An opposition between the sun and Saturn suggests that you might feel too sluggish to tackle burdensome tasks. You’ll feel better if you chip away at something instead of avoiding it altogether. Venus and Mars are facing off too, pushing you to balance your personal pursuits and meshing well with a group.

CANCER
June 21–July 22
Teamwork, professional networking, philanthropy, hanging with friends, joining a group and creating a wish list can all have a positive effect on you this week, with the sun in your hopes-and-humanity zone syncing with Jupiter in Cancer. Being around people will inspire you, so don’t keep to yourself too much. You’ll draw energy from feeling like you’re a part of something beyond yourself and from getting geared up for what’s next. The sun’s opposition with Saturn threatens to dampen your enthusiasm though, and you may find it hard to express yourself spontaneously. Perhaps you feel inhibited or think you’re not being taken as seriously as you’d like. You’ve worked hard on becoming a more complete person who has something significant to contribute, and the question may be where you fit in with others now. Venus and Mars have their own opposition that contrasts home and work or private and public. You don’t have to pick one over the other. It’s about balance.

LEO
July 23–August 22
The sun is clicking with Jupiter in your subconscious sector this week, linking your ambition and your burgeoning faith. You have an intuitive understanding of how to shine at work, or your current status in some way fuels your thoughts about the future. But the sun-Saturn opposition suggests something is interfering with your ability to reach your full potential. Your family, home obligations, underlying doubts, depression or patterns from the past are the likeliest culprits. By now you probably have a sense of what will hold you back until you overcome it. Venus and Mars are also opposing each other, pitting a desire for freedom and adventure against a conflict you’re working out in your head or your everyday busyness. You may be drawn to a different belief, culture or experience or want to get away from it all, but another part of you is fighting this feeling. When what you desire and what you’re doing are at odds, meet yourself halfway however you can.

VIRGO
August 23–September 22
The sun in your exploration house gels with Jupiter in your network sector this week, so an opportunity to travel, learn or have new experiences could come through friends or another kind of group. Be open to whatever comes up; you need to get outside your comfort zone to grow. With the sun and Saturn facing off, pragmatism, negativity or doubt could keep you from broadening your horizons. But pushing past the boundary in your head will give you fresh energy. Do something you’ve never done; go somewhere you’ve never gone. The Venus-Mars opposition implies you might want closeness but feel compelled to defend your turf somehow. The split between “mine” and “ours” could play out in a number of ways, touching on themes of trust, possessiveness, sharing, values, intimacy or money. You may be at odds with your own desires and acting out the conflict with someone else. Being aware of what’s going on inside you is a good first step to improving the situation.

LIBRA
September 23–October 22
There are two noteworthy oppositions between pairs of planets this week, and since you’re the sign of diplomacy, the compromise that oppositions demand shouldn’t be too difficult, in theory. Whether conflict plays out within you or between you and another person, try to be aware of what’s happening and call on your Libran ability to see both sides. With Saturn in your worth zone since October 2012, you may feel like you don’t have enough money, things, talent or confidence. When the sun faces off with Saturn, it could shine a light on feelings of not being enough. Closeness or sharing can trigger insecurity and put your value or values to the test. The face-off between Venus and Mars represents tension between the positive feeling you want to exist between you and other people and the assertiveness, independence—and even fight—that Mars in Libra is lending you. Focus on finding the common ground between your actions and your desires.

SCORPIO
October 23–November 21
One-on-one interactions are paramount, with the sun traveling through your opposite sign. This week’s sun-Saturn face-off pushes you to connect with others, especially if the work you’ve been doing on yourself has isolated you. A conflict between you and another person offers a chance to shine a light on something about yourself. This is a time for you to come out from behind a wall and have a fruitful exchange with people, because connecting will offer perspective and inspiration. The opposition between Venus and Mars implies that your current efforts aren’t matching up with how you want your everyday life to look. You may be working behind the scenes and not getting enough credit. Or you could be subtly acting against your own best interest, falling into a regressive behavior pattern. It’s difficult to assert yourself directly when Mars is retrograde in the last house of your chart. Rest assured this is a temporary frustration, and it won’t be too long before you’ll feel much more effective.

SAGITTARIUS
November 22–December 21
The sun in your efficiency zone is gelling with your ruler Jupiter in your partnership sector this week, hinting that someone can show you how to do something better. Be humble enough to welcome any opportunity to learn, because your skills or your health may benefit. Also look for a chance to work in tandem with someone else and increase your productivity. The sun’s opposition to Saturn could pit your current efforts against the necessity of finishing up something else. Past failures may be haunting your subconscious and draining energy from today’s endeavors. Pay attention to internal pressure, and take it as a cue to cut your losses in some way. The opposition of Venus and Mars indicates possible strain between your own pleasure and having to consider what works for everyone. Your love life, creativity or fun needs to be coordinated with other people’s needs or with your future goals. As with all oppositions, compromise is essential.

CAPRICORN
December 22–January 19
One-on-one interactions are apt to be more pleasant than group encounters this week, due to the fact that the sun in your joy sector is clicking with exuberant Jupiter in your relationship angle and clashing with sober Saturn in your network house. An approach to others that’s rooted in humility, generosity and tolerance can increase the flow of love, fun, creativity and happiness in your life. But your individual fulfillment doesn’t jibe easily with being part of a group now. Teamwork may be challenging, and you need to avoid seeing people as a means to an end. It’s tempting to project your frustrations onto a group of some sort—such as colleagues or friends—when Saturn is in this house, because the difficulties of being a part of something beyond yourself are highlighted. The Venus-Mars opposition calls for balance between home life and professional life or family and ambition. Get past either-or thinking, and aim for a healthy give-and-take throughout the week.

AQUARIUS
January 20–February 18
The sun is pulling your focus to family, home, feelings and the past, and when it syncs with Jupiter this week, a link forms between these things and your efficiency, health, skills, habits, responsibilities, time management, diet, job, daily routine, fitness and productivity. Whether you get serious about an at-home workout regimen or improve your emotional state by managing your time better, find positive ways to connect these two houses. The sun-Saturn face-off calls for you to balance professional responsibilities and making a name for yourself with your inner life and home life. Are you giving equal attention to the person you are out in the world and the person you are deep down in private? The opposition between Venus and Mars could spell a difference of opinion. Or it may contrast pleasant communication and a desire for affection and beauty in your everyday life with your efforts to break new ground and fight for your ideas. Strive for mental balance, as the real conflict is in your head.

PISCES
February 19–March 20
A fortuitous encounter between the energizing sun in your communication sector and effusive Jupiter in your fulfillment zone this week inspires you to express yourself—through affection, creativity, writing, speech or humor. Be in contact with people, join in discussions, actively explore your neighborhood, soak up information and convey your uniqueness with confidence. The sun-Saturn opposition suggests that a limited perspective or uncertainty about the future could cast a dark cloud over your mind. To counter that, get your optimistic side to challenge your pessimistic side. When Venus and Mars face off, there’s a split between the money, things, priorities or confidence you want to have and the resources you share with a partner; your partner’s approach to finances or intimacy; or the struggle to get outside assistance. Bring your focus back to what you yourself can do to acquire what you want. You’re grappling with feelings about security, but it may be hard to explain them. Look to the past for clues.

ARIES
March 21–April 19
With the ego-oriented sun and desiring Venus traveling through the first two houses of your chart, you’re naturally focused on what you want, need and already have. But how others factor into the equation and how you share with them could be trouble spots this week, when the sun and Venus oppose Saturn and Mars in your closeness and relationship houses. You may feel like you can’t count on getting much from another person and need to rely on yourself. The work it requires to combine your life with someone else’s has sunk in with you in the last year and a half, as you’ve tried to come to grips with what people expect from each other and what constitutes a solid bond of trust. If faced with conflict, you’ll find compromise challenging now. Since your issues of independence versus dependence are a repeated theme this week, adopt an attitude of curiosity and try to understand them better.

Follow @astrotherapist on Twitter and email tallennyc@gmail.com to schedule a reading over phone or Skype. Available in-person in NYC! $125 for 60 minutes, $150 for 90 minutes.